Knowledge Handler

Information Sources & Information Sifting Techniques

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Location: Independence, Ohio, United States

I am a retired librarian, most recently serving at Indiana Wesleyan University's Cleveland Education Center.

Thursday, August 23, 2007

Microsoft Tafiti

Tafiti is a Microsoft search tool with a capacity for remembering certain facts you wish to store. In recognition of the positive experience people normally have with public libraries, some of the graphics reflect library card catalogs, etc.
-D.D.

Sunday, August 19, 2007

Frapper Maps

I recently saw a beta for FRAPPR.COM maps. It allows a website to display pushpins from where its vistors reside. It looks difficult to extract data from these maps, though it might let a webpage owner know the geography of his or her market.


If this causes problems, let me know and I will delete this beta mapping function.
-D.D.

Wednesday, August 15, 2007

Mehalo

MEHALO.COM is a subject directory of web sites, developed by a California team of 40 "guides" who select web sites on particular topics. For more information, check the September 2007 issue of FAST COMPANY, pp. 96-102.
Indiana Wesleyan University staff librarians do similar work creating Webliologies for the subject areas covered in IWU courses.
-D.D.

Thursday, August 09, 2007

Retreiving the Past

If you look at the InfoPeople "Best Search Tools" chart (available in PDF format from http://library.home.att.net/business.html or in HTML format from http://www.infopeople.org/search/chart.html ) you will note a reference to "cache" as an option. "Cache" (prononced like "cash") means that that the search engine retains a view of the web page as it appeared when the page was indexed (crawled). If the web page has had recent modifications, the "cache" view will display the way the page looked weeks or months ago, but the search engine link will show the current web page. So selecting cache (when available) allows you a glimpse into the recent past of a website.

For viewing how your company's web site looked years ago, check-out The Wayback Machine http://www.archive.org/web/web.php. The Wayback Machine provides images of webpages for about a decade (though inclusion is spotty).

-D.D.